Voltaire captured this new conception of happiness when he said: “Earthly paradise is here where I am,” and that if paradise is here where I am, then happiness is here and now, not yesterday, and even less in some hypothetical future. Throughout the twentieth century, hedonism’s claims grew ever stronger influenced by Freudianism, feminism, and the avant-garde in art and politics.

via The Cult of Happiness – Peter Barnett – My Telegraph.